AdWords Metrics in a Multichannel World

Those of you who drive website traffic using Google AdWords should consider that social media have affected online behaviors, bringing much more complexity in determining the effectiveness of your use of various online marketing tools.  It is no longer a given that all traffic coming in through your AdWords campaign originated due to that campaign.

A great example of this was recently elaborated by Larry Freed, CEO of analytics firm ForSee.  Consider Mr. Freed's company-published remarks below:

"Ours is a multichannel, multi-device world.  As consumers move across channels, many metrics fall apart.  Consider conversion rate ...the percentage of people who come to your website and take the desired action, such as purchasing something. 

"Let's say a friend tweets about a great Samsung smart TV they bought at Target.  You read the tweet, but since your friend didn't include a URL, you go to Google and enter: "Samsung smart TV Target."  Up pops a pay-per-click ad and you click on it.  Target may look at this and say: "Great, my AdWords campaign is really converting."  But even though the ad was the last click, what really made the transaction happen was that a satisfied customer posted a recommendation via social media."

"This is just one of the factors that makes effective analytics challenging.  ...Trying to simplify your efforts to measure [customer] behavior and attitudes is dangerous."

This is just one more example for readers of my blog regarding the complexity of marketing and the fact that in your marketing analytics you must find out how your ecosystem works and then you must go deep!